


Remembering The Stories -- Part Two (Three Chapters)

by YesBothWays



Category: Xena: Warrior Princess
Genre: F/F, Friendship, Healing, Healing Sex, Hurt/Comfort, Rape, Rape Recovery, Romantic Friendship, Sex, somatic sex, yes both ways
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-24
Updated: 2013-11-24
Packaged: 2018-01-02 12:14:28
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,768
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1056647
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/YesBothWays/pseuds/YesBothWays
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Continuation of a story that takes place in the alternate universe of 'Remember Nothing.'  Amidst the story of her healing, it tells the story of Gabrielle's life as a slave.  Warnings listed before the story.  </p><p>"She watched the steam as it danced in the shifting light.  She lifted her hand to play her fingers through both, watching how they swirled and split, yet could not be broken.  She felt how her fingertips had healed and softened, as they made small intricate patterns in the steam. Looking closely now, what she thought were shadows she saw to be little ink stains.  Even her hand seemed beautiful in this moment.  How long had it been since she'd thought of her body and thought it beautiful?"</p>
            </blockquote>





	Remembering The Stories -- Part Two (Three Chapters)

**Author's Note:**

> This is not for monetary gain. Chapters One and Three depict consensual and pretty explicit sex between our two ladies. Aftermath of trauma including rape is part of the story, but there are no scenes from the past and nothing I felt would likely be triggering. 
> 
> Chapter Two Special Warning: This chapter takes place during Gabrielle's time as a slave. There is cruelty and rape depicted. There is also resistance to both. If you want to read the rest of the story without this chapter, it should stand well alone.

Part Two in Three Chapters

 

Chapter One

 

_The present_

            It had grown cold. Gabrielle lay in a tub of steaming water. She had sunk entirely into the moment, every part of her relaxed, yet vividly aware. The feel of this was new to her, having no part of her awareness stretched out and on guard, aware only of her own body and the room. Reality seemed solid, near, and unthreatening. She felt the smooth curve of the brass tub that supported her back, the seemingly infinite softness of water, and the warmth the water carried into her, as if her body posed no barrier.

            There was a lamp at the edge of the tub. She watched the steam as it danced in the shifting light. She lifted her hand to play her fingers through both, watching how they swirled and split, yet could not be broken. She felt how her fingertips had healed and softened, as they made small intricate patterns in the steam. Looking closely now, what she thought were shadows she saw to be little ink stains. Even her hand seemed beautiful in this moment.

            The thought felt stunning. How long had it been since she'd thought of her body and thought it beautiful? Like a sudden rise of nausea, echoes of voices flashed in her mind, speaking of her beauty, not to her, but in words of ownership. Yet it felt easy just now to let them slip away, to come back to this moment, this night, this house, this room.

            This room, where she and Xena had become intimate. She looked around the room, grown now so familiar. She had not felt safer anywhere that she could remember. Even her girlhood home felt more open, less secluded and private than this. Less her own. Her throat tightened at the thought of that room, drawing away from the sequence of memories it might evoke. She imagined herself like a small animal that had found itself a place, burrowed away deep in some hollowed tree, safe from the outside world.

            She thought about Xena and how they had become lovers. The feel of their intimacy filled this room, pervaded with the way the world felt when they went to bed together. Only a few months had passed, and already Gabrielle marveled at how much time they had spent together. Time could move differently when you were no longer under a master's whip. The crushing need to work endlessly and urgently, the demand that could never be satisfied, and indeed was set up to be unattainable, to strain the very last drop from a person whose life was being used up by another, had shaped much of her life. She and Xena spent hours in bed, and time moved slowly there. They might kiss far into the night, without urgency and without consequence They could reshape their lives however they pleased. Work itself felt different, gentle and easy, even in when the pace was tireless.   Gabrielle lay a long while now, basking in time, which seemed to fill her like rays of the sun.

            When the water had just begun to cool, she heard Xena enter the room. She felt Xena's fingers on her shoulder and turned her face back as Xena knelt down beside the tub. Gabrielle sat up, without a word, and felt her wet hand press to Xena's dry hair as she drew her down. They kissed, a long kiss filled with grace. Xena touched lightly Gabrielle's wet body in the tub. The touch was even more vivid than all else she'd felt that night. It set an imperceptible quake through her. Xena glanced at the water, and Gabrielle knew she noticed it was growing cold.

            "Coming out?" Xena said. The corners of her eyes and mouth hinted the faintest smile.

            "Yes," Gabrielle said.

            She positioned herself and stood up in the tub. Xena had turned and brought her a towel. Gabrielle stood awkwardly, wondering if she would ever get used to the idea of Xena seeing her naked body. She knew she had, many times, but it felt different to stand under it. Xena wrapped the towel around her, under her arms, and drew her into an embrace. Standing imbalanced in the tub, Gabrielle felt steady, leaning against Xena, feeling her strength. She could lift me out of here, if she wanted to, Gabrielle thought. Instead Xena tipped her back, quite gracefully, and moved away so she could dress.

            Gabrielle dried herself, and she was about to pick up her gown. She grew distracted as she heard the sound of Xena removing her dress. She stood and watched instead, as Xena's body was exposed in the firelight. Xena was strangely aware of everything, and she turned, already knowing Gabrielle was watching her. She turned to face her fully, with no shame about her naked body. Gabrielle came to Xena. They embraced, only Gabrielle's towel between them, and kissed.

            A sort of giddiness overcame Gabrielle, and she drew them near the bed. She felt wild and playful, and her usual self-consciousness over her body felt small in comparison. She hooked Xena round the waist, pulling her around. Xena smiled, half resisted, and bit her bottom lip as she grinned. She pushed Xena down to the bed, and Xena relented, controlling their movements, urging Gabrielle to follow her down. She lay over Xena, one knee between her legs. Xena's long arms wrapped around her.

            They had not been naked together like this, save in the depths of a night in which they been so long in one another's embrace, it was hard to grow self-conscious. Their bodies pressed together now, and they both seemed lost in the feel, growing quiet and still. They began to kiss, somewhat shy. Soon they felt the confidence of their familiarity.

            Gabrielle kissed Xena deeply, intending to inflame her passion, and she felt Xena shift on the mattress as her body flooded with desire. She pressed her thigh closer to Xena's body. Gabrielle felt Xena's warmth and wetness against her thigh. How quickly she could be stirred to passion. And how slowly she could be taken, then, to completion. A lover like one of the gods, and somehow stirred endlessly, it seemed, by Gabrielle, her touch, her nearness.

            Xena's hands slipped up her back. Gabrielle did not care. Xena's hands ran over the rough texture of scars, and Gabrielle felt no shame. The touch seemed curious, as if it sought to make a map of her body in Xena's mind. Gabrielle felt that Xena was reading the story of her body, and it put a dart of fear through her heart. The sensation of fear lost itself in the movement of their kisses.

            She had touched Xena so many times now. Felt the desperate heat and softness of her, so delicate and yet so strong. When she had first touched Xena, she remembered how it felt to touch herself when she had been young. In the months that had passed, she had rediscovered this, and alone in their room or in wooded places where she walked alone, she had brought herself to climax. Her mind would drift away, but she could still continue to press and rub and think of their nights in bed and soon find herself shattered with waves of pleasure. Life had brought this back to her, and she still felt surprised by it.

            She touched her now.

            She had longed to press into Xena, and yet up until this night she could not bring herself to do it. Tentatively, her fingers found the opening she sought. Her own heart pounded wildly, a pressure mounting against her ears. Xena's back arched already, at the mere implication of being penetrated. She said Gabrielle's name, a longing in her voice that drove out all worry about consent. She wanted it so badly, Gabrielle could feel her tremble. She brought her lips to meet Xena's as she pressed two fingers into her body. The response was dramatic. Xena moaned, deeply, and held to her. Gabrielle's heart was pounding such, she felt it might burst. All the evidence of consent and pleasure played out before her. You're not hurting her. You're not hurting her, she told herself. She kissed Xena's throat.

            She had taken up the slowest rhythm, and she felt how Xena's body clenched and released against her fingers, alive with desire. The beating of her heart calmed. The pleasure was such that Gabrielle felt carried upon it, like losing oneself to the endless draw of the sea. Gently, she explored Xena, finding many different ways to touch her, feeling and watching for each varied response. She wanted to make it last as long as she could. She felt a strange wish that they might stay this way forever. She felt herself changed. As a young woman, she had imagined losing her maidenhood as some poignant and sacred occasion. That is what this felt like. A moment of intimate passion that could alter one forever and leave one changed.

            Urgency and drive began to build between them. And Gabrielle's thrusts became less inhibited. Xena seemed impossible to hurt, and when she realized this, she grew less afraid. Gabrielle felt a growing desire to bring Xena to a climax. How easy it would be, she realized. She moved her fingers inside Xena in such a way as to bring out one of her impassioned cries. Xena's back tensed, and she had to move so that she sat up, partly, propped up on her arms. Gabrielle repeated the touch more intensely, and captured Xena's open lips, drawing her into a kiss. The cry that sounded in Xena's throat was muted by their kiss. She broke it, keeping their mouths close, to draw in her breath on the next one.

            Gabrielle's touch grew until felt almost rough. A wave of incontrollable heat broke out in Xena's body, seeming almost divine. Gabrielle felt sweat form on her skin. Xena was so close now; Gabrielle knew the very nature of her pleasure. She made several long, slow strokes. Even Xena's breath stopped. As her head tipped back, her weight went back on her elbows. She was taken up entirely in her pleasure. She seemed to have shifted into a state of climax that had no peak. Gabrielle watched adding stroke after stroke, marveling at Xena. Until finally, with a desperate wave of cries, she fell back onto the bed, shaking and coming to completion.

            She opened her eyes and reached for Gabrielle. She drew Gabrielle over her and into the deepest kiss. Soft moans accompanied her kisses. Gabrielle felt that she herself trembled, overwhelmed by what had happened between them this night. Feeling as if it had made its way out of a hidden place quiet and dark, the expanse of Xena's love for her seemed to have been made plain. She found it matched by her own. She trembled, with some fear, but with an excitement, also, that felt beyond them both, how lightening brings to rise the hair on one's skin.

            "Xena," she whispered. Her own voice seemed strange in her ears. It was young, she thought, open.

            "Gabrielle," Xena said her name, drawn out and tender. She felt as if no one had ever said her name before, as if it were a new word that transformed her, calling her true self out and bringing her more into being.

 

Chapter Two

 

_The past_

 

            He was going to take her. Gabrielle could feel it already, the moment she came into Mezentius's palace. He took one look at her, and she knew. But he was a busy man, he couldn't be bothered. And perhaps he knew from his man who purchased her at the market that her back had not yet healed.

            The house maiden was set to her care. She brought Gabrielle a set of clothes. Gabrielle watched the blue shirt with its rips and blood stains burn in the fire. Her old life, her old self, burning away before her eyes.

            "They nearly killed you," the woman said, as she looked at Gabrielle's back.

            The wounds were finally closed and didn't bleed anymore. They had opened again and again, widening, until at last, a physician was paid to burn them shut. Chained, already, Gabrielle was held down by four guards as he did. He was angry, because he was a doctor. He wanted to give her something for the pain, but they forced him, saying they were in a hurry and would not pay. The lines were still covered over in scabs. She wondered, in all the time they had remained open, why she had not caught a fever and so died.

            "I hit a guard," Gabrielle said to the woman, then, "My sister got away," her voice barely a whisper. She saw the moment like a revelation, solid and more real than this present moment – throwing herself into the guard as hard as she could and watching Lila as she ran. She did not even feel the guard's hands as he grabbed her and started to beat her.

            "Brave girl," the woman said. Her voice was soft, and Gabrielle felt it held awe but even more pity. She helped Gabrielle to wash and put on the clothes. She was brought to a young man.

            "I'm Tygren. I'm to show you your work," the young man said. He was a slave, but he seemed proud, with a strong chest. He was not unkind, and he set Gabrielle to work a set of pulleys hauling grain. After a while, the pain took over. She felt her skin pulling, tugging on the seams the physician had formed. She imagined herself split open, as if by one of Zeus's thunderbolts. The punishment of the gods. Why had it fallen on them, she wondered? She was growing delirious. Tygren returned. He looked at her with concern.

            "Were you whipped?" he said. She gave a faint nod. He looked stricken.

            "Come this way," he said. He put her to do wash, which stretched her back less.

            So the days passed. Late in evening, they all sat and ate. Gabrielle had lost count of the days, but it must have been three weeks. She had noticed Mezentius's gaze on her when he came down to the servants quarters to look everything over, inspecting the place and handing out punishments. Tygren came and sat near her that evening.

            "He'll take you soon," Tygren said. A long silence passed as they sat, before he continued. "He likes to ruin maidens. Those, he brings in all the time, and soon after he sells them at a loss." Gabrielle could feel his hate, seething under the surface. The guards were watching them, and Tygren looked back at them a moment. Gabrielle noticed how they were the only ones among the slaves who looked up. "See how they look at me," he said, softly. "I won't survive long here." He turned to Gabrielle. "They take the strongest from the market. On purpose. Those are the ones he likes to break."

            Gabrielle thought on his words, as she lay on the thin pile of blankets on the dirt floor. She had been given a place near the fire, a kindness perhaps due to her young age or her injuries. The room was cold. Soon the women would shiver in their sleep and grow weary. Winter took many lives in this place.

            Her heart was stirred this night. It could not consign itself to its fate. I'll die here, Gabrielle thought. Tygren knew already he would not be able to survive, that he would be killed. She felt it likely would not be long for herself either. With each heartbeat an image flashed through her head. She might find a knife and try to kill Mezentius. As much as she wished it, her heart was not ready for that kind of hate yet. She might give up, let herself be worn down. She might just try to survive. Not everyone made the same choice in this place, among the broken, fragmented choices given them by the Fates.

            He had taken other girls since she had come. She was set to the wash. She cleaned blood out of his sheets, knowing it belonged to women who worked the palace, some of whom slept nearby. One such girl had been crying two nights before, a pitiful sounds. She kept quiet so as not to disturb the others.

            Gabrielle felt strangled with the idea that this would soon be herself. She lay awake when she needed so desperately to sleep, for tomorrow's work. He likes to ruin maidens. A thought crossed Gabrielle's mind. She lay a while with it, and she felt how it gave her some calm. She put her hand to her mouth and touched between her legs. In the cold room, in this place, her body felt so frail, it was a terror. She bit her hand and broke herself open.

 

            It had been over a year for Gabrielle in Mezentius's palace. She had taken from him his pleasure of deflowering her when she first came. But he still had come to send for her often. He would set her to jobs near him. He had sent for her now. Gabrielle entered Mezentius's room.

            "Come here," he said. Gabrielle's body obeyed without her willing it to move. She had felt the voice in her throat had become a still, cool stone.

            Coarsely, he opened her clothes. He pushed her over his desk, covered in parchment. The feel of parchment was under Gabrielle's hands, and all her senses went there a moment. She was already going away. The room felt as if had drawn away from her. Like a little house told of in a story's page. The feel of parchment, Gabrielle's mind repeated.

            He had raised her skirt and entered her, and Gabrielle barely noticed. He drove into her, angered by her lack of response. Gabrielle kept her hands loose, against the parchment, resisting the urge to grip her fists. She felt instead the other animal's skin. It felt intimate, as if she were drawing close to another who had been lost for his uses. It was as if her spirit had drawn away and touched now that of the animal drawn from the parchment. We're still here, Gabrielle's mind said to it.

            Relentless, he grew even rougher than usual. Now he gripped the far edge of the table and pulled it, as he pressed so hard, Gabrielle could not keep her breath or suppress a sound of deep pain. Her body shook against the table, until her breath came in and out again, at last. That was all he wanted. He was sated and finished easily and quickly after that.

            Gabrielle's mind had gone quiet. She felt little, sensations coming like echoes down a hall to a mind barely stirred from deepest dreaming. She came to partially when he turned her over, the stretch of her back on the table filling her with pain that broke through even her guarded state. He was looking her over. She could not really see his face.

            He laughed once, and he pushed her off to the side. He dressed himself and casually went back to what he had been doing, assuming she would leave on her own. She could not remember gathering her things and leaving the room, but she must have, for she was in the hall. There was a guard's voice. Suddenly, he was holding her arms.

            "Take care of that elsewhere. There are guests," he heard him say. She did not know what he meant. She heard her voice say something, but could not understand it. She pictured it as the sound of a stone tapping, tapping against the stone walls. It had no meaning one could know.

            She was aware that he hesitated a moment, then led her into a room off the hall. She came to some more, and she realized the guard was helping her finish putting on her clothes. He hadn't spoken. He did not seem violent. She wondered what were his thoughts. He was carrying her partly, then, making their way through the main floor of the palace. He left her at the base of the stairs, in the servants' hall.

            Gabrielle's thoughts swirled as she walked down the hall. The pain became clearer, and she realized her hips were bleeding into the fabric of her skirt. She remembered in a flicker of thought how the bones of her hips had ground into the table. The pressure was great enough, it had broken her skin. Pain was breaking out everywhere now, and she could imagine the bruises blooming, like lichen on the palace walls, as the blood rose. Her breath was stifled, and there was a pain like a knife stuck shallowly in her side. Crushed, she thought. Her mind rolled the word like a sea shell in one's hand. It was pretty. Even in this ugly hall. Her fingers touched the lichen on the wall. Crushed.

            Her thoughts were clearing, only slightly, and she tried to pull them back together, to come back to the moment. She knew many things. Her rib might be cracked. She was his favorite, because she could not be broken. She knew she was growing more and more able to hate. Soon, she would be able to kill him. The opening would come. She tested her bravery at every moment. An end would come. Soon, she knew.

 

            "You got the bastard!" Lyceus yelled. Gabrielle was still staring at the sword. Bright red, she thought. Like a bird flashing across the sky as it rose from the fields. Potedia. The single word rang in her mind. Lyceus ran up to her, and Gabrielle quelled an urge to turn the sword on him, disoriented. Xena must have seen this, because, as she made her way swiftly to them from across the room, she called out.

            "It's over! It's alright now!" She took the sword from Gabrielle's hands. Lyceus was giddy with their success. A strange look was in Xena's eyes as she looked at Gabrielle.

            Alone in their room, Xena had helped Gabrielle wash Mezentius's blood off her hands. Gabrielle was strangely cold and stiff, her thoughts and feelings stifled. She sat on the edge of the bed, as more water heated. Xena knelt in front of her and took her hands, which Gabrielle allowed, though she had not yet grown to trust Xena.

            "How can you not think me a monster?" Gabrielle said. Xena looked at her face. She did not answer. Her eyes burned with an intensity that seemed unearthly. Gabrielle felt an entire world there beneath the surface that she could not see.

            "I know monsters," Xena said. Her voice was flat and cold as iron. It seemed as if it spoke from another life.

 

Chapter Three

 

_The present_

            Gabrielle sat in the alcove of a tree's roots. She had come for a walk as it was the first warm day of spring. The forest smelled of new life. She felt filled with a sensuous energy, as if she had drawn near to the earth and was herself awakening. A force of life unquenchable seemed to rise insider her. It made her feel full, her body almost heavy, as she made her way through the woods. She came to this place, an incredibly secluded spot she found, that could only be got to by walking a narrow path between stones and water to find a little widened place where the tree grew.   She often sat long here and watched the rushing stream.

            She lay, almost napping, yet not quite asleep. The energy inside her felt as if it spread out in all directions. She thought of her life, her work, her stories, and of Xena. After a time, she decided to bring herself to pleasure. From the first touch, she felt it would be different today. Rather than struggling against the overwhelming sensation, Gabrielle felt that it took her up, entirely, and lifted her. She was set rushing, in all directions. She was brought to heights that might have been the precipice on another day. But today they became the journey. When at last she climaxed, a cry escaped her. She lay surprised, hearing it echo in her mind. She had never heard her own voice sound out in pleasure.

            The mood did not pass that day, in which Gabrielle spent long hours in the woods and came home to write by a little fire in her room. Xena had gone to the next village on some errands, and Gabrielle heard her arrive. She put away her scroll, wanting to keep it private. She was standing when Xena entered the room and smiled. Gabrielle took one look at her, and Xena felt passion rise in her own body. Gabrielle came to her at once. Soon they were in bed.

            The energy Gabrielle brought to their encounter seemed new, and Xena felt for where it might lead. She made no move to come over Xena or lead their encounter on its usual course. She seemed instead quite willing to have Xena take the lead and to focus longer on Gabrielle. She kissed Gabrielle's lips, her throat. She touched her breasts through her dress, then removed it and kissed each one. She had done so before, in the night. She marveled still at how different Gabrielle's response was in this life at having her breasts touched. She took pleasure, though she never made a sound, and if Xena lingered too long, it made her tremble and grow uneasy. Tonight, it seemed, they moved past this. Xena took her nipples between her lips again and again. And Gabrielle's body was relaxed, taking in the pleasure. Still Gabrielle did not change their dynamic, and Xena wondered where it would lead. She felt her heart quicken desperately.

She touched Gabrielle's lips. Gabrielle drew Xena's hand up to look at it, touching Xena's fingers. So beautiful. She was always struck by Xena's hands. She brought Xena's fingertips to her mouth and touched them lightly to her tongue. She saw how Xena's eyes were dark with desire. She was sure she could feel Xena wanting to take her, a desire that showed little on the surface. Xena made no demands, and it often led Gabrielle to question what she wanted. She pressed her hand to Xena's chest, felt her heart. It beat with a desperate ferocity. After another kiss, she hid her face on Xena's neck, as she brought Xena's hand down between her legs, for the first time.

            Everything went still. Xena barely breathed, she was so focused on the sensation of Gabrielle under her fingertips. She stroked her, one delicate stroke. Gabrielle's whole body trembled. Xena felt how heightened desire and fear had become for each of them. She sought to steady herself, deepening her breath. Xena held Gabrielle close, and felt her shudder slightly under each stroke. A sound came from Gabrielle's lips, so soft it was barely audible. Xena's entire body shook in response, and she felt nearly overcome with desire. She was starving for this. So long in coming, if felt to Xena, as Gabrielle touched her again and again, yet gave no sign she wanted to be touched. She had learned to hold memories of the past too close, for fear things would be too different in this life. They came rushing in now, more than she could keep at bay.

            She was able to bring Gabrielle to greater and greater pleasure under her touch. Her body was ready, Xena could feel. Without a thought, she slipped her fingers into her. She had not realized how much she was anticipating a response that mirrored the past. Gabrielle had been so responsive to this first moment of entry, and Xena was ready for her to cry out or at least arch her back, as she would have. Instead, she had almost the opposite response. Slowly, the energy seemed to drain out of her, until she lay almost still. The response felt uncanny to Xena, who leaned up to look at her face. There was little to be read there.

            "You can if you want," Gabrielle said. Her voice seemed weak, as if it came from afar. It was not a statement of desire, but of permission. And it made Xena's throat clench. She rubbed her face on Gabrielle's shoulder to hide it a moment. She steadied herself so as not start weeping then and there. So unlike Gabrielle before, when she had not been a slave. Come back to the moment, Xena told herself.

            Xena tried touching Gabrielle again, not entering her this time. But things had shifted, and Xena grew distressed at Gabrielle's lack of response. She drew her hand away from Gabrielle and rose up to look down at her again. Gabrielle moved slowly, her breath shallow, and her eyes nearly closed. Her body seemed to have lost some of its life. Xena felt a knot of pain in her throat, which she pushed away. She kissed Gabrielle and felt her unresponsive. After several more kisses, still they were not the same.

            You should not be over her, Xena thought. Her mind acknowledged swiftly this flash of intuition. She leaned up, and brought Gabrielle with her until they were sitting. Stopping a few times to kiss, she repositioned them entirely. This seemed to draw Gabrielle out of her stupor, slowly. She actually shook her head, slightly, as if waking.

            Xena moved them so that Gabrielle sat now on the edge of the bed. Xena was behind her and moved in close, her legs alongside Gabrielle's. She tangled her long legs in Gabrielle's. She drew them carefully open. Gabrielle's body was held up by Xena's own, and she leaned back. Xena ran her hands over her thighs, then her breasts. Gabrielle gasped and shivered. When she felt all the tension had left Gabrielle's body, and she had grown heavy with desire, she put her hand once more between her legs.

            Gabrielle gave the slightest moan. She grasped Xena's arm around her, holding her close. She shivered as Xena continued to stroke her. Xena swayed them lightly, remembering that time long ago, when they had become lovers in another world, where Gabrielle had taught Xena not to fear. She touched Gabrielle's breast, then the other, kissed her neck. When Gabrielle came under hand, Xena held her, and she closed her eyes, overcome with the depth of her own want that was being sated.

            Xena knew Gabrielle, well. She felt the climax was weak compared with the passion in her body and knew there could be more. This knowing came not just from the past, it was now. She moved out of bed. Surprising Gabrielle, she knelt down before her. Xena kept everything terribly slow. Opening Gabrielle's legs, Xena kissed the insides of her thighs. Gabrielle was leaning back onto her hands, without Xena's support, and looked down at her. Her lips were parted, her eyes very heavy. When Xena leaned in to kiss her, Gabrielle gasped, partly in surprise. She burned with a sort of shame, tears rising to her eyes, as she felt a horror of her own body. Ruined she thought, an echo of some words spoken long ago. They floated through her, ghosts passing through. Xena held a moment, then kissed again, longer, and Gabrielle gave a sound of pleasure, like the one she made in the forest. She was tender from having climaxed already, and it was the softness of Xena's lips and tongue that allowed her to slowly bring her to new pleasure. Xena set up a rhythm as she held Gabrielle's body in her hands. It took much longer to climb there this time. Gabrielle lay back, letting the sensations Xena was causing her wash through her. She lost all sense of time, then lost all sense of herself or anything beyond the pleasure Xena was causing, as she came to another peak of pleasure like that of this morning the forest, yet far beyond.

            A desire seized her, to her surprise, that felt almost desperate, like weeping. Gabrielle reached down and drew Xena's hand between her legs, and led her to place her fingers inside once more. Xena felt anxious, wondering if she truly wanted this, as she entered her again. Gabrielle grew stiff, but Xena could not tell whether it was in pain. She focused on her hand, and on Gabrielle's response so closely, it consumed her. Gabrielle saw the intensity of Xena's focus, and felt a pang in her chest at how great Xena's love was for her.

            Xena found her much more open than she had known before. She had always taken delight in coaxing her, until her body drew Xena inside. Xena could feel that such care had not been taken with her in this life. She burned a moment with hatred. But Gabrielle was in her arms, and she brought herself back. She touched each place inside Gabrielle, finding Gabrielle's response new and changed. Xena stopped breathing a moment, when she turned her hand and her fingers found a knot of scars just inside towards her back. Gabrielle drew her breath in when Xena began, instinctively, to work the scar under her fingers. She began first of the slow work that would eventually cause it to melt away. This seemed to cause Gabrielle neither pain nor pleasure, though she responded intensely. Xena wondered if she knew it was there. She worked it until Gabrielle lay back trembling and eventually lay calm.

            She stopped then. She rested her head a moment in Gabrielle's lap. Her mind trailed back over all that had happened. So unprecedented, Xena thought, save perhaps in the look on Gabrielle's face when Xena came in. She heard Gabrielle begin to weep. Leaning back, feeling more her own body, she wondered if she might weep also.

            She stood up, wanting them to be in one another's arms. Gabrielle was moved at once by the same desire. They found a familiar place in their bed. Gabrielle put her head on Xena's shoulder. She felt spent, yet the great energy she felt all day still pulsed, softly, in her body. Xena touched her hair and kissed it. How strange it is, she thought, to be lying here, in this place, under so much restoration. How strange to feel the great intensity with which the heart in her chest could burn.

 

The End

**Author's Note:**

> I love hearing from people, so if you're up for leaving a comment, thought, or a kudos please do!


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